"Latin America rode the coattails of what may be seen as the most significant event of the 21 Century--the rise of China. As China grew from a poverty-stricken nation to the largest economy in the world, many Latin Americans boomed. Latin American countries sent iron ore to be forged into steel for China new cities; copper to lace China's boom electronics industry with wire; petroleum to fuel hundreds of millions of new cars. Indeed, from 2003 to 2013 Latin America experienced a China boom. Beginning in 2014 however, the boom began to fade, with China's economy slowing in general and shifting toward a consumer-based economy less dependent on natural resource imports. Latin America was caught over-exposed to China, and had saved very little of its China windfall to prepare for the future. The region now faces slow growth, and increasing social and environmental conflict. Drawing on ten years of research and traveling along the China-Latin America economic relationship, Gallagher tracks how the rise of China impacted Latin America, how Latin America squandered much of the benefits gained during its China boom, and how Latin Americans can better position themselves to turn growing Asian trade into prosperity"--